The globe is warming and if we don't stop it most of the people on earth will probably die prematurely. Sounds like a good reason to me, but maybe I'm just "shouting".
Ensure that you've done proper research in to an issue before you speak on it.
Just screaming about problems isn't useful. This is especially true if you are demanding action be taken. If you want someone to take action, it is reasonable to expect that you are able to tell them what action to take, and that action should be reasonable.
From a recent Greenpeace petition:
"The July energy package is a good first step to addressing the serious issue of global warming by increasing efficiency measures, providing tax credits for wind energy, and repealing tax breaks for Big Oil. However, the bill does not include two critical policies needed to address global warming- a renewable electricity standard and increased fuel efficiency for vehicles.
Right now the House has the opportunity to take significant steps forward in combating the serious impacts of global warming and helping the economy by including a renewable electricity standard of 20% by 2020 and increasing fuel efficiency standards to at least 40 mpg. "
Now, maybe I missed the "screaming" in there, or the part where they make uninformed demands for action without a clue what should be done. But it looks to me like a pretty reasonable and quite specific plan for practical actions congress can take to mitigate the US role in global warming.
Honestly, I don't know where people get this stuff. I guess it's just part of the mythos of environmentalists. They're all wild-eyed tree-hugging hippies who love whales more than people, and are too drug-addled to understand science or rational argument. It just ain't so, but I can understand why it's a comforting preconception to hold - it allows you to discount their arguments as biased and irrational de facto, without the bother of actually considering any inconvenient points they may actually make.
It's good that you take action - that's admirable and should be commended. The initial impression I got from your loud complaining is that that's all you do: complain and criticize.
I guess that goes to show how initial impressions can be deceiving. Just because your most noticeable, attention-getting action was complaining doesn't mean you aren't also doing positive, constructive things that aren't as publicized...
There's definitely room for criticism of Greenpeace's campaigns, I just take issue with the idea that any campaign which involves publicity stunts and crowd pandering is inherently worthless, and should be condemned as self-centered attention seeking. Sometimes publicity stunts, even though they may not follow all the rules of a formal debate, are the best option for accomplishing a worthy goal.
And also, for the record, I have difficulty taking seriously people who criticize activists with the argument "if they really care, what they should really be doing is...". While it's fair to make constructive criticism and offer better ideas, it seems like a cop-out to just dismiss someone else's hard work simply because you were able to come up with a theoretical alternative action that you think would be better. After all, if you really cared, you'd be following your own advice and taking action instead of passively criticizing other's efforts:-)
Well there are plenty of morons that just like shouting about all the things that are bad with society, rather than trying to provide any solutions.
This is a generic argument trotted out tirelessly when people are confronted with activists who they don't agree with. It can just as easily be applied to you: All you're doing is complaining about how bad environmentalists are, what's your alternative? You offer no solutions for how we can get society to be responsible with ecosystems if not by being environmentalists? Are you just some kind of anti-environmentalist "causehead"?
That's not a fair argument, though. You have a right to criticize just as environmentalists do, and your criticism - like theirs - can be a valuable step towards improving things in general. I don't want to live in a world where people are condemned for pointing out problems unless they have a comprehensive plan to fix the problem. Intellectualized kneejerk anti-activism is the beloved ally of stubborn ignorance.
However the majority of their activities are media friendly, poorly researched, publicity stunts.
When the weapon of choice among those doing huge damage to the environment is soundbytes and photo-ops, sometimes we have to fight back with the same. It feels dirty and is depressing, but the fact is that you can't change the world today with a strong research paper, or even a well-researched persuasive essay - at least when you have the forces of multi-million dollar PR firms arrayed against you.
I know it offends our geek sensibilities to see people playing fast and loose with the facts, but I'm not sure there's another way. Reasoned research and data has to be the backbone of any legitimate movement, of course, but it alone can't capture the attention of the public to the extent needed to create real change.
The vast, vast majority of people are ignorant about the facts behind environmental issues, and are going to remain stubbornly ignorant of the facts forever, period. Far better that they should be ignorantly in favor of preventing environmental catastrophe than ignorantly apathetic. Like I said, it's depressing, but we have to realize that turning everyone into enlightened statistics geeks is pretty much the worst strategy for actually preserving the environment.
And this headline couldn't more clearly refute your claim - "Child porn case shows that an open WiFi network is no defense"
But the crime in that case wasn't committed over an open wireless network. The argument was that a search warrant shouldn't have been granted because of the open access point, it didn't have anything to do with plausible deniability. The guy was caught with CDs of child porn in his room, which is pretty open and shut, he was just trying to get off on a technicality about the search warrant. The precedent this case established was that an open access point wasn't enough to eliminate the probable cause needed for a search warrant, it didn't make any judgment about plausible deniability.
you are obviously NAL and should stop dispensing questionable legal advice
Fair enough, but as far as I know there is no legal precedent which says that you bear legal responsibility for all traffic that happens to travel through your publicly available network. And furthermore, like I said, if there was such a precedent, it would open up everyone with a malware-infected computer to prosecution for computer crimes. "Common carrier" status is a long established precedent which would appear to apply to individuals with open access points, and though it's true I'm not a lawyer, I'm not aware of any high-level judgments which say otherwise. Let me know if there are any.
Even then it may get broken, but that's where plausible deniability comes into it.
You always have plausible deniability, even if you don't have a access point at all. It's completely possible and quite frequent that people's computers are 0wned by viruses and trojans, and used to route anonymous traffic, send spam, and mounts scans and attacks on other machines. If securing your systems was required to give plausible deniability, millions upon millions of computer users could be subject to criminal prosecution right now.
i'd personally factor in the cost of the possibility of dealing with the police or FBI at some point
Nothing can protect you from having to deal with the police or the FBI. The RIAA habitually uses bogus, unreliable IP records to prosecute people who had nothing to do with the accused crime. The police are known to make similar mistakes, and the FBI has a long honorable history of seizing computer hardware on "hunches" or anonymous unsubstantiated tips they received.
Keeping your network open doesn't put you in any more legal danger. But more importantly, locking down your network doesn't make you any safer from arbitrary harassment by the authorities.
If your grandparents are still alive, ask them. They've been through it, twice. And follow your own instincts; millions of years ov evolution are on your side.
Unfortunately, your instincts are evolved to deal with raising a child in say, 2000 b.c., and your grandparents experience would be most relevant to raising a child in the 1940s.
While it may seem cliche, the world has changed a lot since then. The technological, but more importantly social landscape has changed significantly since then, and old techniques of parenting have a high chance of being irrelevant in today's environment. For example, my grandparents would say that my daughter should never be allowed in a room with a boy unaccompanied until she's an adult or engaged.
Of course, there are some good old techniques, the trick is sorting out which ones are time-tested and relevant, and which are archaic, wrongheaded silliness.
Sort of like if you were to ask someone in Brazil or Pakistan for parenting advice. Some of their advice would be appropriate, but it's not as easy as saying "Brazilians have the answer to child-rearing, do what they do!"
That's a really good point, hadn't thought of it quite like that. It's sort of a "tragedy of the commons" scenario. We've all paid a flat fee for a lot of our energy costs through taxes, so it's in everyone's interest to use as much electricity and oil as possible, in order to get the best deal for their tax payment. Require individuals to take responsibility for the costs associated with their individual energy use (both in terms of the costs of production and the external costs created by pollution), and maybe people won't be so power hungry.
Race for the Cure is sexist bullshit. Until we have a yellow ribbon or a brown ribbon (for colorectal cancer, which kills FAR MORE PEOPLE), I'm not going to wear a pink ribbon
Dude, you're not being oppressed here. A bunch of women decided they wanted to raise awareness about breast cancer and got a lot of people behind their effort. If you want a colon cancer awareness ribbon, go make one and start raising money for your foundation. Don't begrudge their popularity simply because your pet cause isn't as successful.
That's really not true though. I mean, if you track down a really macho belligerent guy and determinedly heckle him in front of his friends, maybe you'll evoke a violent response. But the vast majority of the time, when you insult or act offensively to a stranger you'll get one of two responses:
- They'll ignore you or otherwise try to avoid confrontation.
- They'll express anger or threaten you aggressively, but not follow through.
People always want to make you believe they're going to "kick your ass" when they're angry, and they may even half-believe it themselves. But people are actually rarely willing to be violent to a stranger for a trivial reason.
I think that perhaps the perceived threat is what matters though. Whether or not people will actually attack you for being rude in RL, it's a possibility we can imagine, and fear of that possibility might keep us in line.
Interesting! It's far from a controlled comparison, but I wonder if the context of that web survey - outlining several different ways to be involved in politics - changed the responses people gave, instead of TFA which asked in effect "What non-political thing would you be willing to trade your vote for?"
More likely, it's probably just a different pool of subjects responding to yours. Still cool though.
A web page is put up on the internet for the specific function of being viewed. It is analogous to posting a flier on a public bulliten board. A wifi can be set up by third party techs in a house for family use. It is reasonable to expect others to not trespass.
You're begging the question. "WiFi should be considered private because, unlike the web which is considered public, wifi can be considered private."
Employment is by contract, slavery is by force. There's a big difference.
I agree, if you agree to a contract, you're being employed, not enslaved. Really, the issue at hand is the contract. A contract is a legally (or morally) binding agreement freely entered into by two parties.
But what happens when one of the parties is less than free? What happens when the employer deliberately creates a situation where the employee doesn't really have a choice in signing another contract? When the employee effectively has no choice, it's not really accurate to call the agreement a contract, because only one side has freely entered into it.
Here's a metaphorical fairy tale: A stranger is afflicted with a magical curse which destines him to die painfully if he doesn't sign a contract with someone in the next 10 minutes. I, being a "prosperous free man", quickly draw up a contract which reads "I agree to work for xappax for the next month for $2 a day" and present it to him to sign. Of course, he does so, preferring my conditions to a painful death.
Now, it's not my fault that the stranger was afflicted by a curse (it's the evil wizard's:). However, I did take very cruel advantage of the fact that he was cursed, using the "tyranny" of the curse and his lack of choice in signing a contract to my distinct benefit. Now, I think this in itself is unethical, but perhaps you don't. However as a prosperous free man, my next course of action is a logical extension of the first.
Since I have the stranger working for me now, I send him into the dark, scary forest every day to pick flowers from the evil wizard's garden. Because of this, it's no surprise when one day he comes back with a similar curse. So, being the benevolent prosperous free man I am, I again present a contract which will save his life...and extend his term of employment for another month at $1 a day. Some soft-hearted fool had been hoping to present a different contract which would demand nothing of him but a one-time $0.02 payment, but since the stranger was living and working on my property, I was fully within my rights to eject the fool and his propaganda.
The metaphors here are obvious, but let me spell them out. The curse is the circumstances a worker finds themselves in: having a starving family, no decent clothes or possessions with which to move and start a new life/career, having illnesses, and then later, being heavily in debt to the employer. All these things make it an urgent, non-negotiable matter that they work at the factory, or die. The evil wizard is the factory town itself, which has the effect of causing and exacerbating all the problems of poverty, sickness, and debt, making it all the more urgent to work at the factory.
I think that if we operated in a world where everyone really could freely enter into contracts with each other, then it would be very reasonable and ideal to use contact law as a litmus test to decide whether wrongs have been committed. But unfortunately, that's very far from the reality today.
why would anyone do anything if there wasn't some degree of personal satisfaction in it for them?
True, there's always a degree of personal satisfaction involved. I guess I meant don't take action expecting instant gratification. For example, if you openly call out a popular politician on his lies at a public forum, don't get discouraged when - rather than being praised and converting everyone, you're dragged through the mud by the public and media alike.
Basically, a glorious epic victory doesn't happen in real society the way it does in Hollywood, but a lot of people think it does and become apathetic when they learn it ain't so.
The industrial revolution, which happened around the time of the enlightenment and founding of the United States, could not have happened if men were not allowed to be industrialists. Industrialists must keep what they earn, they cannot be oppressed or subject to regal whim or other personal restrictions... and when men became free during this time, they prospered.
I'm sure you have your own contorted libertarian analysis of the American industrial revolution, but it does at least bear pointing out that the industrialists you hold up as "prosperous free men" also turned millions of American workers into de-facto slaves, living in "company towns" owned and fully controlled by factory owners.
Somehow I don't associate the era of "Robber Barons" with freedom, but I guess we identify with different types of people. It certainly was a time of great freedom for super-wealthy entrepreneurs.
I can inspire others to see things my way, too...as soon as I overcome the apathy and stupidity
This is a circular argument. You're justifying your own political apathy because other people are apathetic. You're saying you shouldn't bother to be an activist because other people won't bother to join you.
All those other people are thinking the same thing. It's a reinforcing circle of apathy, with each person reassuring his/her neighbors that there really is nothing they can do about anything, better to just live quietly and only worry about yourself.
There's only one way to break out of this cycle, and it doesn't start with other people. Take action now, whether it'll make a visible difference or not. Each person who takes action now reduces the amount of discouraging apathy that's holding others back. Turn the reinforcing circle of apathy into a reinforcing circle of activism.
Basically, the two real sides in political conflict today are apathy and activism, and apathy is winning heavily. So it doesn't even really matter what you're doing or whether it's working so much as that you're doing something at all.
Give it some time. Your efforts do change things, usually in subtle ways you may not even ever know about. Don't get discouraged when taking action isn't personally satisfying for you - that's not the point. The point is creating real, practical change. Eyes on the prize...
then we spend our billion on making real change happen.
Yeah, it seems like the survey and analysis of the study was intended to measure young people's apathy towards politics, but it doesn't even consider the other possible explanation:
Young people care so much about politics that they don't see a vote as a worthwhile way of changing society, and they realize that having financial resources is the real deciding factor of who can cause political change.
I'd like to see other spinoff surveys with questions like: On election day would you rather:
A) Vote
B) Have a statement of your choice broadcast on national television
C) Participate in a blockade of a Lockheed-Martin missile factory
D) Get a free iPhone
Neither does IPodLinux or Puppy Linux, or OpenWRT, both of which are designed to run on machines with even worse specs than the XO-1. However, they have very active user communities and are able to run a lot of "mainstream" Linux software (not so much on the IPod, but you'd be surprised!).
I think the idea that if a project isn't using high-end hardware and running a "Top 5" linux distro then it's somehow alienated from the open source community is ignoring the long tradition of running Linux on unconventional platforms. The history of Linux and open source strongly suggests that it will be possible, if not trivial, to port all sorts of mainstream software to a totally new hardware platform.
Re:You really need to try this
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thanks for changing the name. "Democracy Player" just screamed "hippie".
If you write off anything related to democracy or being involved in government as "hippie", and you write off anything "hippie" as unworthy or undesirable...I don't even know what you tell you, other than "you're missing out".
For years, "democracy" has been a code-word for "we get to kill the middle east and spy on you". Maybe it's time we reclaimed its true meaning, instead of trying to disassociate ourselves with dissidents in the hope of being more acceptable.
Re:If there was only content worth watching
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It's not really justification enough to say "well, they don't like something that I really, really like". It's not a personal insult to you if other people don't like it.
The "you suck" comment wasn't really related to the story about Miro, though. It's like saying "Firefox sucks, I used it and couldn't find any websites that weren't garbage!"
So the comment was flamebait in that it (intentionally or not) distracted the thread into arguing about the quality of web content in general as opposed to discussing the software in question.
Ethics are a subjective matter - that change with time, place, society and so on. In that respect, ethical conformity is a very poor argument for or against performing any action. It's survival of the fittest, and ethics by themselves just don't cut it in this game - unless they provide a significant advantage to the group as a whole.
That's bordering on nihilism. Call me a wide-eyed idealist, but I think that some things are simply wrong regardless of what the majority/government/culture says. And I prefer to take responsibility for living according to what's right and wrong, rather than just doing what everyone else says is and isn't ok and rationalizing it with some pomo philosophical handwaving.
You can't go on the internet and find a community of hundreds of thousands writing stuff for your laptop, since it lives in its own world. Granted I'm sure they want to build such a community, but it will never be as deep as the normal Linux desktop community.
Ok, so you're not going to be able to install Ubuntu packages, but it is still running Linux, it's basically just a new distro. It's not like it's that hard to put existing software into packages for a new distro - people do it every time a new version of any distro comes out.
Alternatively, you could look at it as a feature: There's this new, undeveloped open-source platform that's unique to the third world. It's a gold-plated invitation to third-world entrepreneurs. This creates a niche market where people in the third world can learn to program, and profit from those skills by doing development for their own communities as opposed to first world code sweatshops. It also makes it more likely that the platform will evolve to suit their unique needs, instead of the people evolving to fit the expectations and requirements of preexisting first world software projects.
but not in a "we've done research and this really helps" way.
You just dissed their method because you were pretty sure for some vague reason that they hadn't done any research to back it up. Then you advanced your own educational method without anything whatsoever to back it up.
I'm not a teacher or researcher, but I can give the anecdotal experiences of my friends and I in elementary school. We had a computer lab, even a computer class where we got to do nothing but interact with the computers. But we never really learned much from that. My first really engaging experiences with computer were when I was stuck at school at the end of the day, and the teacher signed me in to a computer and let me do whatever I wanted to pass the time. During those times, the time spent with the machine was mine, not part of school, and I could do things that interested me.
Shortly after those experiences, I got a computer at home, and it was a whole new world. I had effectively endless unstructured time to mess around with it, figure out how to make it play games, get online, etc. Owning the thing gave me the freedom to use it outside of school, and that's what really got me engaged.
Slashdot Mirror
The globe is warming and if we don't stop it most of the people on earth will probably die prematurely. Sounds like a good reason to me, but maybe I'm just "shouting".
Ensure that you've done proper research in to an issue before you speak on it.
Ok, how about this?
They have big lists of problems but never any real solutions.
Greenpeace Solutions.
Just screaming about problems isn't useful. This is especially true if you are demanding action be taken. If you want someone to take action, it is reasonable to expect that you are able to tell them what action to take, and that action should be reasonable.
From a recent Greenpeace petition:
"The July energy package is a good first step to addressing the serious issue of global warming by increasing efficiency measures, providing tax credits for wind energy, and repealing tax breaks for Big Oil. However, the bill does not include two critical policies needed to address global warming- a renewable electricity standard and increased fuel efficiency for vehicles.
Right now the House has the opportunity to take significant steps forward in combating the serious impacts of global warming and helping the economy by including a renewable electricity standard of 20% by 2020 and increasing fuel efficiency standards to at least 40 mpg. "
Now, maybe I missed the "screaming" in there, or the part where they make uninformed demands for action without a clue what should be done. But it looks to me like a pretty reasonable and quite specific plan for practical actions congress can take to mitigate the US role in global warming.
Honestly, I don't know where people get this stuff. I guess it's just part of the mythos of environmentalists. They're all wild-eyed tree-hugging hippies who love whales more than people, and are too drug-addled to understand science or rational argument. It just ain't so, but I can understand why it's a comforting preconception to hold - it allows you to discount their arguments as biased and irrational de facto, without the bother of actually considering any inconvenient points they may actually make.
I do take action. I've written my MP(Canada)
It's good that you take action - that's admirable and should be commended. The initial impression I got from your loud complaining is that that's all you do: complain and criticize.
I guess that goes to show how initial impressions can be deceiving. Just because your most noticeable, attention-getting action was complaining doesn't mean you aren't also doing positive, constructive things that aren't as publicized...
There's definitely room for criticism of Greenpeace's campaigns, I just take issue with the idea that any campaign which involves publicity stunts and crowd pandering is inherently worthless, and should be condemned as self-centered attention seeking. Sometimes publicity stunts, even though they may not follow all the rules of a formal debate, are the best option for accomplishing a worthy goal.
:-)
And also, for the record, I have difficulty taking seriously people who criticize activists with the argument "if they really care, what they should really be doing is...". While it's fair to make constructive criticism and offer better ideas, it seems like a cop-out to just dismiss someone else's hard work simply because you were able to come up with a theoretical alternative action that you think would be better. After all, if you really cared, you'd be following your own advice and taking action instead of passively criticizing other's efforts
Well there are plenty of morons that just like shouting about all the things that are bad with society, rather than trying to provide any solutions.
This is a generic argument trotted out tirelessly when people are confronted with activists who they don't agree with. It can just as easily be applied to you: All you're doing is complaining about how bad environmentalists are, what's your alternative? You offer no solutions for how we can get society to be responsible with ecosystems if not by being environmentalists? Are you just some kind of anti-environmentalist "causehead"?
That's not a fair argument, though. You have a right to criticize just as environmentalists do, and your criticism - like theirs - can be a valuable step towards improving things in general. I don't want to live in a world where people are condemned for pointing out problems unless they have a comprehensive plan to fix the problem. Intellectualized kneejerk anti-activism is the beloved ally of stubborn ignorance.
However the majority of their activities are media friendly, poorly researched, publicity stunts.
When the weapon of choice among those doing huge damage to the environment is soundbytes and photo-ops, sometimes we have to fight back with the same. It feels dirty and is depressing, but the fact is that you can't change the world today with a strong research paper, or even a well-researched persuasive essay - at least when you have the forces of multi-million dollar PR firms arrayed against you.
I know it offends our geek sensibilities to see people playing fast and loose with the facts, but I'm not sure there's another way. Reasoned research and data has to be the backbone of any legitimate movement, of course, but it alone can't capture the attention of the public to the extent needed to create real change.
The vast, vast majority of people are ignorant about the facts behind environmental issues, and are going to remain stubbornly ignorant of the facts forever, period. Far better that they should be ignorantly in favor of preventing environmental catastrophe than ignorantly apathetic. Like I said, it's depressing, but we have to realize that turning everyone into enlightened statistics geeks is pretty much the worst strategy for actually preserving the environment.
And this headline couldn't more clearly refute your claim - "Child porn case shows that an open WiFi network is no defense"
But the crime in that case wasn't committed over an open wireless network. The argument was that a search warrant shouldn't have been granted because of the open access point, it didn't have anything to do with plausible deniability. The guy was caught with CDs of child porn in his room, which is pretty open and shut, he was just trying to get off on a technicality about the search warrant. The precedent this case established was that an open access point wasn't enough to eliminate the probable cause needed for a search warrant, it didn't make any judgment about plausible deniability. you are obviously NAL and should stop dispensing questionable legal advice
Fair enough, but as far as I know there is no legal precedent which says that you bear legal responsibility for all traffic that happens to travel through your publicly available network. And furthermore, like I said, if there was such a precedent, it would open up everyone with a malware-infected computer to prosecution for computer crimes. "Common carrier" status is a long established precedent which would appear to apply to individuals with open access points, and though it's true I'm not a lawyer, I'm not aware of any high-level judgments which say otherwise. Let me know if there are any.
Even then it may get broken, but that's where plausible deniability comes into it.
You always have plausible deniability, even if you don't have a access point at all. It's completely possible and quite frequent that people's computers are 0wned by viruses and trojans, and used to route anonymous traffic, send spam, and mounts scans and attacks on other machines. If securing your systems was required to give plausible deniability, millions upon millions of computer users could be subject to criminal prosecution right now.
i'd personally factor in the cost of the possibility of dealing with the police or FBI at some point
Nothing can protect you from having to deal with the police or the FBI. The RIAA habitually uses bogus, unreliable IP records to prosecute people who had nothing to do with the accused crime. The police are known to make similar mistakes, and the FBI has a long honorable history of seizing computer hardware on "hunches" or anonymous unsubstantiated tips they received.
Keeping your network open doesn't put you in any more legal danger. But more importantly, locking down your network doesn't make you any safer from arbitrary harassment by the authorities.
If your grandparents are still alive, ask them. They've been through it, twice. And follow your own instincts; millions of years ov evolution are on your side.
Unfortunately, your instincts are evolved to deal with raising a child in say, 2000 b.c., and your grandparents experience would be most relevant to raising a child in the 1940s.
While it may seem cliche, the world has changed a lot since then. The technological, but more importantly social landscape has changed significantly since then, and old techniques of parenting have a high chance of being irrelevant in today's environment. For example, my grandparents would say that my daughter should never be allowed in a room with a boy unaccompanied until she's an adult or engaged.
Of course, there are some good old techniques, the trick is sorting out which ones are time-tested and relevant, and which are archaic, wrongheaded silliness.
Sort of like if you were to ask someone in Brazil or Pakistan for parenting advice. Some of their advice would be appropriate, but it's not as easy as saying "Brazilians have the answer to child-rearing, do what they do!"
That's a really good point, hadn't thought of it quite like that. It's sort of a "tragedy of the commons" scenario. We've all paid a flat fee for a lot of our energy costs through taxes, so it's in everyone's interest to use as much electricity and oil as possible, in order to get the best deal for their tax payment. Require individuals to take responsibility for the costs associated with their individual energy use (both in terms of the costs of production and the external costs created by pollution), and maybe people won't be so power hungry.
Race for the Cure is sexist bullshit. Until we have a yellow ribbon or a brown ribbon (for colorectal cancer, which kills FAR MORE PEOPLE), I'm not going to wear a pink ribbon
Dude, you're not being oppressed here. A bunch of women decided they wanted to raise awareness about breast cancer and got a lot of people behind their effort. If you want a colon cancer awareness ribbon, go make one and start raising money for your foundation. Don't begrudge their popularity simply because your pet cause isn't as successful.
In the real world, that would get you dropped
That's really not true though. I mean, if you track down a really macho belligerent guy and determinedly heckle him in front of his friends, maybe you'll evoke a violent response. But the vast majority of the time, when you insult or act offensively to a stranger you'll get one of two responses:
- They'll ignore you or otherwise try to avoid confrontation.
- They'll express anger or threaten you aggressively, but not follow through.
People always want to make you believe they're going to "kick your ass" when they're angry, and they may even half-believe it themselves. But people are actually rarely willing to be violent to a stranger for a trivial reason.
I think that perhaps the perceived threat is what matters though. Whether or not people will actually attack you for being rude in RL, it's a possibility we can imagine, and fear of that possibility might keep us in line.
Interesting! It's far from a controlled comparison, but I wonder if the context of that web survey - outlining several different ways to be involved in politics - changed the responses people gave, instead of TFA which asked in effect "What non-political thing would you be willing to trade your vote for?"
More likely, it's probably just a different pool of subjects responding to yours. Still cool though.
A web page is put up on the internet for the specific function of being viewed. It is analogous to posting a flier on a public bulliten board. A wifi can be set up by third party techs in a house for family use. It is reasonable to expect others to not trespass.
You're begging the question. "WiFi should be considered private because, unlike the web which is considered public, wifi can be considered private."
Employment is by contract, slavery is by force. There's a big difference.
:). However, I did take very cruel advantage of the fact that he was cursed, using the "tyranny" of the curse and his lack of choice in signing a contract to my distinct benefit. Now, I think this in itself is unethical, but perhaps you don't. However as a prosperous free man, my next course of action is a logical extension of the first.
I agree, if you agree to a contract, you're being employed, not enslaved. Really, the issue at hand is the contract. A contract is a legally (or morally) binding agreement freely entered into by two parties.
But what happens when one of the parties is less than free? What happens when the employer deliberately creates a situation where the employee doesn't really have a choice in signing another contract? When the employee effectively has no choice, it's not really accurate to call the agreement a contract, because only one side has freely entered into it.
Here's a metaphorical fairy tale: A stranger is afflicted with a magical curse which destines him to die painfully if he doesn't sign a contract with someone in the next 10 minutes. I, being a "prosperous free man", quickly draw up a contract which reads "I agree to work for xappax for the next month for $2 a day" and present it to him to sign. Of course, he does so, preferring my conditions to a painful death.
Now, it's not my fault that the stranger was afflicted by a curse (it's the evil wizard's
Since I have the stranger working for me now, I send him into the dark, scary forest every day to pick flowers from the evil wizard's garden. Because of this, it's no surprise when one day he comes back with a similar curse. So, being the benevolent prosperous free man I am, I again present a contract which will save his life...and extend his term of employment for another month at $1 a day. Some soft-hearted fool had been hoping to present a different contract which would demand nothing of him but a one-time $0.02 payment, but since the stranger was living and working on my property, I was fully within my rights to eject the fool and his propaganda.
The metaphors here are obvious, but let me spell them out. The curse is the circumstances a worker finds themselves in: having a starving family, no decent clothes or possessions with which to move and start a new life/career, having illnesses, and then later, being heavily in debt to the employer. All these things make it an urgent, non-negotiable matter that they work at the factory, or die. The evil wizard is the factory town itself, which has the effect of causing and exacerbating all the problems of poverty, sickness, and debt, making it all the more urgent to work at the factory.
I think that if we operated in a world where everyone really could freely enter into contracts with each other, then it would be very reasonable and ideal to use contact law as a litmus test to decide whether wrongs have been committed. But unfortunately, that's very far from the reality today.
why would anyone do anything if there wasn't some degree of personal satisfaction in it for them?
True, there's always a degree of personal satisfaction involved. I guess I meant don't take action expecting instant gratification. For example, if you openly call out a popular politician on his lies at a public forum, don't get discouraged when - rather than being praised and converting everyone, you're dragged through the mud by the public and media alike.
Basically, a glorious epic victory doesn't happen in real society the way it does in Hollywood, but a lot of people think it does and become apathetic when they learn it ain't so.
The industrial revolution, which happened around the time of the enlightenment and founding of the United States, could not have happened if men were not allowed to be industrialists. Industrialists must keep what they earn, they cannot be oppressed or subject to regal whim or other personal restrictions... and when men became free during this time, they prospered.
I'm sure you have your own contorted libertarian analysis of the American industrial revolution, but it does at least bear pointing out that the industrialists you hold up as "prosperous free men" also turned millions of American workers into de-facto slaves, living in "company towns" owned and fully controlled by factory owners.
Somehow I don't associate the era of "Robber Barons" with freedom, but I guess we identify with different types of people. It certainly was a time of great freedom for super-wealthy entrepreneurs.
I can inspire others to see things my way, too...as soon as I overcome the apathy and stupidity
This is a circular argument. You're justifying your own political apathy because other people are apathetic. You're saying you shouldn't bother to be an activist because other people won't bother to join you.
All those other people are thinking the same thing. It's a reinforcing circle of apathy, with each person reassuring his/her neighbors that there really is nothing they can do about anything, better to just live quietly and only worry about yourself.
There's only one way to break out of this cycle, and it doesn't start with other people. Take action now, whether it'll make a visible difference or not. Each person who takes action now reduces the amount of discouraging apathy that's holding others back. Turn the reinforcing circle of apathy into a reinforcing circle of activism.
Basically, the two real sides in political conflict today are apathy and activism, and apathy is winning heavily. So it doesn't even really matter what you're doing or whether it's working so much as that you're doing something at all.
Give it some time. Your efforts do change things, usually in subtle ways you may not even ever know about. Don't get discouraged when taking action isn't personally satisfying for you - that's not the point. The point is creating real, practical change. Eyes on the prize...
then we spend our billion on making real change happen.
Yeah, it seems like the survey and analysis of the study was intended to measure young people's apathy towards politics, but it doesn't even consider the other possible explanation:
Young people care so much about politics that they don't see a vote as a worthwhile way of changing society, and they realize that having financial resources is the real deciding factor of who can cause political change.
I'd like to see other spinoff surveys with questions like:
On election day would you rather:
A) Vote
B) Have a statement of your choice broadcast on national television
C) Participate in a blockade of a Lockheed-Martin missile factory
D) Get a free iPhone
it looks nothing like any other linux distro
Neither does IPodLinux or Puppy Linux, or OpenWRT, both of which are designed to run on machines with even worse specs than the XO-1. However, they have very active user communities and are able to run a lot of "mainstream" Linux software (not so much on the IPod, but you'd be surprised!).
I think the idea that if a project isn't using high-end hardware and running a "Top 5" linux distro then it's somehow alienated from the open source community is ignoring the long tradition of running Linux on unconventional platforms. The history of Linux and open source strongly suggests that it will be possible, if not trivial, to port all sorts of mainstream software to a totally new hardware platform.
thanks for changing the name. "Democracy Player" just screamed "hippie".
If you write off anything related to democracy or being involved in government as "hippie", and you write off anything "hippie" as unworthy or undesirable...I don't even know what you tell you, other than "you're missing out".
For years, "democracy" has been a code-word for "we get to kill the middle east and spy on you". Maybe it's time we reclaimed its true meaning, instead of trying to disassociate ourselves with dissidents in the hope of being more acceptable.
It's not really justification enough to say "well, they don't like something that I really, really like". It's not a personal insult to you if other people don't like it.
The "you suck" comment wasn't really related to the story about Miro, though. It's like saying "Firefox sucks, I used it and couldn't find any websites that weren't garbage!"
So the comment was flamebait in that it (intentionally or not) distracted the thread into arguing about the quality of web content in general as opposed to discussing the software in question.
If enough ignorant people misuse a phrase then that misuse becomes 'common usage'. It doesn't make it correct, whatever thefreedictionary.com says.
:)
Which begs the question: Are you like, a total stuck-up loser, or what?
j/k, j/k
Ethics are a subjective matter - that change with time, place, society and so on. In that respect, ethical conformity is a very poor argument for or against performing any action. It's survival of the fittest, and ethics by themselves just don't cut it in this game - unless they provide a significant advantage to the group as a whole.
That's bordering on nihilism. Call me a wide-eyed idealist, but I think that some things are simply wrong regardless of what the majority/government/culture says. And I prefer to take responsibility for living according to what's right and wrong, rather than just doing what everyone else says is and isn't ok and rationalizing it with some pomo philosophical handwaving.
You can't go on the internet and find a community of hundreds of thousands writing stuff for your laptop, since it lives in its own world. Granted I'm sure they want to build such a community, but it will never be as deep as the normal Linux desktop community.
Ok, so you're not going to be able to install Ubuntu packages, but it is still running Linux, it's basically just a new distro. It's not like it's that hard to put existing software into packages for a new distro - people do it every time a new version of any distro comes out.
Alternatively, you could look at it as a feature: There's this new, undeveloped open-source platform that's unique to the third world. It's a gold-plated invitation to third-world entrepreneurs. This creates a niche market where people in the third world can learn to program, and profit from those skills by doing development for their own communities as opposed to first world code sweatshops. It also makes it more likely that the platform will evolve to suit their unique needs, instead of the people evolving to fit the expectations and requirements of preexisting first world software projects.
but not in a "we've done research and this really helps" way.
You just dissed their method because you were pretty sure for some vague reason that they hadn't done any research to back it up. Then you advanced your own educational method without anything whatsoever to back it up.
I'm not a teacher or researcher, but I can give the anecdotal experiences of my friends and I in elementary school. We had a computer lab, even a computer class where we got to do nothing but interact with the computers. But we never really learned much from that. My first really engaging experiences with computer were when I was stuck at school at the end of the day, and the teacher signed me in to a computer and let me do whatever I wanted to pass the time. During those times, the time spent with the machine was mine, not part of school, and I could do things that interested me.
Shortly after those experiences, I got a computer at home, and it was a whole new world. I had effectively endless unstructured time to mess around with it, figure out how to make it play games, get online, etc. Owning the thing gave me the freedom to use it outside of school, and that's what really got me engaged.